


I will battle for the sun

by lilibel, sirona



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bantering, Clint and Nat are snarky bastards, F/M, Get Together, M/M, Misunderstandings, Multi, OT3, PTSD, Perceived Unrequited Love, Pining, Suit Porn, Surprises, amnesia (temporary), angst (resolved), author's slight obsession with Bucky fucking Barnes, gardening love, happy endings, i say slight, losing a body part, regained memory, some Britishisms due to the setting, war injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-24
Updated: 2013-08-24
Packaged: 2017-12-24 12:08:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/939841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lilibel/pseuds/lilibel, https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirona/pseuds/sirona
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>London. 20th century. An heiress, a businessman, and a gardener. Secrets, lies, friendship. And always, love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I will battle for the sun

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Avengers Reverse Big Bang challenge on LJ. 
> 
> This has been a joy to work on, and that's in no small part due to the wonderful, wonderful Lilibel. I couldn't have asked for a better partner in crime! Her work is beautiful and she has been so amazingly supportive and encouraging throughout. It has been the best experience for me, and I just hope she's enjoyed the process as much. :) Many thanks also to Pollyrepeat who has been, as always, a fantastic hand-holder and beta and just plain best all round. <3 Title from Placebo -- pretty much the theme song for this fic (and, I think, for Bucky Barnes at all times.)
> 
> The art masterpost can be found [here](http://lilibel.tumblr.com/post/59183083958/art-masterpost-for-the-rbb-avengers-information). Please go tell Lilibel what a smashing job she's done! :)

[ ](http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/lilibel/506865/1067235/1067235_original.jpg)

  
"Steve," he says.

Steve opens his eyes. 

"Bucky," he croaks, sitting up immediately and rubbing the sleep from his eyes with the heel of his hand. "God, Bucky, _hi_. How're you feeling?"

Bucky considers the question, consults his ravaged body before picking up the strength to speak.

"About the same I way I look, I guess," he supplies weakly, mouth cracking in a pathetic attempt at a smile. 

Steve doesn't seem to have the same difficulty -- he never really did, not like Bucky. His face shines with one of his devastatingly adorable smiles, the kind that Bucky has to swallow around just to keep breathing.

"That good, huh," he says warmly. Bucky wants to take the sound of his voice and the look in his eyes and wrap them around himself, snuggle in and just stay.

"Flattery will get you everywhere," he rasps, trailing off into a cough that, _fuck_ , it feels like it's splitting his side open. Steve reaches for a plastic cup of water immediately, worming an arm under his shoulders to prop him up enough to drink from the straw. Bucky does, greedily, draining the glass; Steve refills it one-handed and offers it to him again. Bucky isn't thirsty anymore, but he takes a few more sips, just so Steve will stay where he is for one more second, maybe two, holding him close. It's a guilty pleasure; Steve touches him all the time, but not like this, not like Bucky is something precious he wants to keep close. Bucky knows he shouldn't be taking advantage like this, but fuck it, he takes what he can get. He knows there's a chunk of time missing from his memory, but he doesn't think he'd forget something like that, not all his dreams coming true.

Steve lets him rest back onto the pillow after a moment, of course he does; but he moves back to the plastic chair by Bucky's bed, drags it closer with an ear-splitting screech they both wince at until his left hand rests comfortably on Bucky's right -- the only one he's got left, now. Bucky doesn't want to be clingy but he turns his palm to rest against Steve's, squeezing back when Steve's fingers twist around his. 

"The doctor told me," Steve starts, then pauses, searching for words that won't scrape Bucky's skin raw to hear. Since there _aren't_ any, not when it comes to this, Bucky grits his teeth and ploughs straight on, rips the field dressing off sharply, all at once.

Whoever tries to tell you it hurts less that way, they're lying through their teeth.

"Yeah. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, that's me."

Steve winces. He always was more empathetic than Bucky; for all he'd dreamt of enlisting, it would have been a disaster. He'd have been a tough soldier, a brilliant strategist, but it would have left something inside him dead, cut off and bleeding out instead of scabbing over like in most of the people in Bucky's squad--

He pulls himself up short, because was that--that was a _memory_ , he's sure of it--

But no, it's fucking gone, fucking bastarding _hell_. He squeezes his eyes shut tightly, bares his teeth, tries to hang on. 

Eventually, Steve's quiet voice reaches him, penetrates inside the bundle of torn-up nerve endings that is his head these days.

"I'm sorry," he says after another minute of Steve softly, patiently repeating his name, telling him he's okay now -- it's a lie, but Steve tells it anyway, and Bucky knows he's willing it to be true. 

"I thought I remembered something," he says roughly, and Steve's death grip on his hand relaxes a little.

"The doctors said you might remember eventually, but you've been through a hell of a shock, Buck. Don't rush it. It'll come. In the meantime, you're staying with me, for as long as you need."

Bucky laughs hollowly. "You sure you want an invalid on your hands?" he says roughly, unnecessarily vicious, but he can't help it; the empty socket of his left shoulder grates at him, reminds him of what he'll never see there again, of how he'll never be whole. It's not Steve's fault, but he's the closest person around and Bucky just wants to bite into something and rip.

Steve glares at him, a patented Steve scowl that makes Bucky grin because at last, something so familiar it's like no time has passed at all.

"James Buchanan Barnes, don't think I won't kick your ass, bed-ridden or not."

"Wow, full name, you must be serious."

"I'd say 'stop being a jerk', but considering that would be like saying 'stop breathing'--"

Bucky laughs, nudging Steve's knee with his, a terrible approximation of a kick. "Asshole. I'm in a hospital, you oughta be nice to me."

"Never been big on rules," Steve replies without missing a beat, and god, this, this is what Bucky has been aching for, even if he doesn't remember missing it. He squeezes Steve's hand, hopes he gets it even if Bucky doesn't know how to say it.

"You're gonna have to catch me up on what's been going on around here. Last I remember, I was getting on a plane to go back to the 'Stan the second time, and you'd just cried all over me."

"Did not," Steve says indignantly, even though he _totally_ did, that last memory is loud and clear, bright like it had known it'd be something Bucky would be hanging on to for dear life (he had).

"So. A nineteen month gap, then," Steve muses after a small pause. Bucky can see the gears turning in his head already, working out the best way to deal with this. Steve has always been _so_ much smarter than him. Bucky guesses there's a reason Steve's a multimillionaire to Bucky's lowly soldier. "Guess we'll be bringing you up to speed a while. Better call reinforcements."

Bucky squints at him. "If you're thinking Dum Dum and Monty, you'd better stock up on the booze."

"Already done," Steve says cheerily. He looks pretty happy with himself, and the whole sorry business; Bucky wouldn't normally miss the chance to needle him about having fun at his expense -- but he can feel himself start to slip already, sink under the heavy yet welcome blanket of good drugs and exhaustion and Steve's presence next to him, soothing and warm. It's a losing fight. His last waking thought is dedicated to remembering to ask Steve what could have possibly happened that he's pleased Bucky doesn't remember it, and that Steve's smile is the last thing he wants to see at night for as long as he's got left.

\---

[ ](http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/lilibel/506865/1068006/1068006_original.jpg)

  
"Bucky," Steve says.

Bucky opens his eyes. It's like waking from a dream; he'd had no idea he'd drifted off like that, but more and more over the past year, he has felt safe to let go and just _be_ , sometimes ankle-deep in mud and happy as a clam, but more often like this, kneeling on sun-warmed grass, gloved hands in his lap while he tilts his face to the rays and breathes, and breathes.

"Hey, Steve," he says, smiling and bringing up his arm to shield his eyes, the better to see him.

Steve is clad in one of his usual impeccably tailored suits, his tall, lanky frame looking lithe and gorgeous, not that Bucky's ever going to say that out loud. Still, he's a sight for sore eyes, a tall drink of cool water, and Bucky couldn't stop looking at him if he tried.

"You're gonna mess up those fine shoes," he teases; it rained this morning, and he can feel the dampness under his knees where they press into soil still busy absorbing the moisture. The scent is delicious -- green, fresh, alive, soothing in a way no office ever could be. Turns out there's a reason shrinks recommend taking up gardening as therapy. 

Steve mock-frowns, lifting one foot to inspect his muddy loafer. "Yeah, well, if Mohammed won't come to the mountain..."

Bucky rolls his eyes. "Mountain, really? Gotten a bit high and mighty, have we? Need a poker night to bring you back down to Earth?"

Steve breaks character and laughs, kicking oh-so-gently at Bucky's thigh, like he's afraid to touch him with anything heavier than a feather. Frankly, Bucky's getting damn tired of it.

"Shut up, jerk," Steve says, fond enough that no sting remains. "I haven't seen you all week, all right? You've been too busy for your old pal. Might say 'takes one to know one'."

Bucky laughs like he's meant to, but he winces inside all the same. It's been a hell of a week, going through the motions of hiring two new people, vets like himself, an awful blankness in their eyes that Bucky remembers from not too long ago. There had been long, irksome hours behind a desk, sorting out the paperwork, making plans for expanding the business, and god, he'd missed this, getting filthy, dirt all the way to his elbows despite the gardening gloves, a streak up his cheek and forehead, if Steve's amused gaze is any indication.

"Sorry," he says, shedding the gloves and rubbing at his face with his right hand. "If it's any consolation, I was fucking miserable, cooped up in the office."

Steve wrinkles his nose sympathetically (Bucky's chest does a familiar leap; he breathes through it, squashes the warmth back down, keeps it from showing on his face with the ease of long practice).

"That's tough, buddy. But you're done now, right? Your pals all set up?"

Bucky agrees with a shrug. "Yeah, yeah, my fellow psychos are all mine now."

He laughs at Steve's outraged frown -- Steve hates it when he disparages himself, but hey, it's true. All vets have some kind of twist in their minds, practically comes with the job -- survive a tour or three and it's pretty much a done deal that you'll have issues. Hell, some days Bucky still jumps three feet in the air when a door slams on an air current, and it sucks all the more when he can't _remember_ what he's reacting to; his last tour is nothing but a blank spot in his head, and his first one wasn't really all that eventful. 

Then again, he woke up minus an arm, so. He tries to cut himself some slack most of the time.

He might not remember his second tour, but apparently Clint and Natasha do, all too well. They'd come looking for him a couple of months after the end of their third tour, and they'd filled in some of the blanks still lingering in Bucky's memory, like holes in Swiss cheese -- like how he'd lost his phone, for example, something they took immense pleasure in relating (Clint) and assuring him that every word of the story was true when he protested (Tasha). Bucky still maintains that even _he_ wasn't that big of a clutz, to fall on his phone when shoved in a fountain (a nice double whammy that had put paid to even the most resilient of military-speck cases). Steve hadn't stopped laughing at him for a week solid.

(They'd also told him of how he'd jumped on a grenade thrown at his patrol while they were in the middle of a narrow street between houses on both sides, no way to predict it, no way to plan for it, no way to react but by instinct. It's a miracle he survived at all, they'd told him, and all of them owed him their lives. Bucky might not remember a thing of it, but apparently Tasha, Clint, and the others were never going to forget, so. That's something, at least. Makes the loss that much easier to bear.)

When Steve doesn't respond immediately, Bucky waves at him to get on with it, the silvery metal of his left arm flashing in the sun, unapologetically exposed by Bucky's cut-off sleeves. It's a beauty, if he does say so himself, a marvel of engineering and design and damn hot to boot. "Ain't got all day," he lies -- for Steve, he's got just about the rest of his life -- but there's no need to tell him that, either.

Steve rolls his eyes, but he grins, happy and boyish and too damn adorable for his own good. 

"Was gonna see if you wanted to grab a beer and a burger with me and Tony, but if you're _that_ busy..."

Seriously, Bucky does not know why he keeps this snarky, sassy punk around, and he tells him so.

Steve's eyes crinkle a little, like they only do when he lets himself go, drops the mask that carries him through his day as a corporate shark. Every time he sees that look, Bucky wonders what he's done to deserve it, to keep getting it day after day.

"You love me," Steve gloats, nudging Bucky's thigh with the tip of his loafer again. 

Bucky doesn't do anything embarrassing like cry with despair. Instead, he mutters, "Self-assured asshole," and takes Steve's hand when he offers it and hauls himself to his feet. Steve's his height now, has been for nearly a decade, but it still surprises Bucky to see his blue, blue eyes peering at him from so close, like he could just lean in and--

"You coming or not," Steve says impatiently, that tone in his voice when he's trying not to manage Bucky too obviously; like he thinks this is for Bucky's own good and he'll stop at nothing to see it happen.

Bucky shrugs, flexing his arm consideringly. "Guess Stark's gonna sulk if I don't give him a chance to check on his baby," he agrees, biting hard on the inside of his cheek to keep from showing how pathetically pleased he is to be included. 

Steve throws one arm over his shoulder, tucking him into his side like Bucky's a much smaller person. It's distressingly enjoyable. 

"I still can't believe you volunteered for physical testing, Buck. You're a braver man than I."

It's a well-worn, familiar argument, a whole lot less charged than it had been a year and change ago when Steve's fellow genius multimillionaire had approached him (behind Steve's back, to boot). Tony had wanted to surprise his friend -- and he had. Steve had been this close to smashing his face in when he'd found out, but by then the neural pathways had fused and set and there really hadn't been anything he could do. Behind his easy ribbing, Bucky can still hear the barely-leashed fear that something might go wrong and Bucky might be taken from him again. Whatever else went on (or didn't) between them, the one thing Bucky would never doubt was that he _is_ Steve's best friend, and Steve would do just about anything for him. 

He shrugs now, flexes his shoulder muscles on purpose, brings up the gorgeous metal alloy and shoots a finger gun at Steve. "Might not have, if you'd told me upfront he's fucking _nuts_ ," he says, a shade louder than if it were just for Steve's benefit. 

Right on cue, there's an outraged "Hey!" from the direction of Steve's obscenely wide drive, and Bucky grins like the devil he is when he spies Stark leaning against the latest in a long line of eye candy that he keeps torturing Bucky with. He can't help the stare, or the trickle of drool that threatens to escape from the corner of his slack mouth. Stark grins evilly, mollified by the worshipful, covetous looks Bucky keeps throwing the Aston Martin DB9 Tony's ass is planted against. 

"Hot damn," he drawls appreciatively, slipping from under Steve's (warm, delightfully firm, sinfully tempting) arm to concentrate on giving the gorgeous doll a proper once-over. 

"I got the feeling he's gonna try and hump her," Tony stage-whispers to Steve, who snorts and then unsuccessfully tries to hide his sniggers. Bucky extends his middle finger in their direction, flesh hand gliding along her fabulous curves.

"Hop in, horndog," Tony says after not nearly enough time, voice still rich with laughter, and Bucky doesn't have to be told twice, but--

"Shit. I gotta go change, can't be tracking mud inside her," he says, screwing his eyes closed in annoyance. He should've got changed before he came out here, but--well, he'd been loathe to relinquish the quiet joy of Steve's arm around him, hadn't he? "You leave without me, you can both tend your jungles by yourselves," he warns, bargaining with the only thing he's got and glaring painful death at them as he backs towards the side door. Luckily, Tony blanches at the mere mention of being made to chip away at his precious time with his machines for anything else so unquestionably low on his list of priorities. 

Steve--well, Steve just stares at him like he's lost his mind, eyebrows raised all the way to his hairline.

Despite that patently disbelieving look, if Bucky's honest with himself (and he tries to be, since his brain is unreliable enough these days without the added strain of keeping his story straight, even inside his own head), Bucky is half-afraid he's going to come back out tugging his clean(ish) shirt on over his freshly washed face to find they'd ditched him, decided not to bother waiting. He knows it isn't fair, that Steve would be seriously upset if he even suspected Bucky felt this way, but god knows Bucky's broken, not even halfway back to whole, and Steve is a saint to put up with him and all his issues but even he has got to be getting tired. 

But no -- there they are, two of the most gorgeous people Bucky has ever met, leaning side by side on the Aston, twin smiles of welcome on their faces when they spot him returning. Bucky's chest constricts, and he has to clear his throat, harangue them into getting in the car already, just so they won't see how bright his eyes are, how tight his throat feels.

Steve lets him ride shotgun though, and squeezes Bucky's shoulder when he climbs out of the tiny back seat, and Bucky can't escape the realisation that swamps him, that he's done for and he knows it.

\---

"Steve," Bucky says.

Steve opens his eyes, whipping his head around to where Bucky lounges in the doorway of his study. He shuts them again immediately, clutching at his head and wincing.

Bucky, because he's a bastard, laughs at him.

"Rough night?" he mocks, smirking at Steve's glower. "Partied til dawn? How much did Tony make you drink?"

Steve groans, with feeling. "Christ, I hate fundraisers. Well, no, correction. I like fundraisers, I _hate_ networking."

Bucky takes mercy on him, and ambles down to the kitchen for a cup of the blackest of black coffees in existence. Steve murmurs gratefully when Bucky places the cup in front of him, downing half of it in a single draught. Bucky perches on the edge of Steve's massive dark walnut desk least swamped by piles of paper, and watches as Steve's eyes gradually clear and his cheeks regain their colour.

When he feels sufficiently human to rejoin the world, Steve darts him a curious look, not something Bucky's seen on his face -- that he remembers. There's something about it Bucky doesn't like, that makes his heart rate pick up, makes him feel like the ground's shifting under his feet.

"What's on your mind, Steve?" he asks, because fuck it, he has never been the guy to run away from the scary things (--well. Unless they were the kinds of things to lead to losing his best friend. He'll always be a coward about those).

Steve looks away, then squares his shoulders and drags his eyes back to Bucky's. By now, Bucky's spider senses are screaming ABORT ABORT, but then Steve opens his mouth, and--

"I met someone last night," Steve says, and Bucky's world narrows down to keeping his face open and his body from collapsing in on itself.

"Yeah? Good for you, buddy. What's her name?" he manages; he even rustles up a smile, and wow, Steve has got to be distracted by that woman or he'd have had no trouble picking up how close it is to cracking.

"Margaret Carter," Steve says, with this small, sweet smile that makes Bucky want to break things. 

It's his own damn fault, and he knows it. He's had nearly four years now to do something about the small matter of Steve being the centre of his _entire world_ , and he's cocked it up yet again. He let the fear take over, and now it's too late, much too late. 

"--Buck?" Steve says. There's a hint of worry in his tone, like he's said his name a bunch of times already. "You okay?"

The mere thought of letting Steve guess what's bothering him is--intolerable. He says the first thing that comes into his mind. 

"Sounds familiar, but I can't place her."

Steve smiles again; his whole face lights up, eyes clear and animated. Bucky wants to _die_.

"She's the CEO of Carter, Jones and Denier, they own a dozen fashion and luxury goods brands. Maybe you've seen her in those ladies' magazines you're always reading."

"They're Natasha's idea," Bucky insists reflexively, wrinkling his nose sheepishly when Steve arches both eyebrows at him, calling him a liar without opening his mouth. It's surprisingly effective, even when he is clearly hungover as hell. "Whatever, I buy them for the waiting room," he says grandly, more than willing to be distracted from the topic at hand by any means possible, because if he has to listen to Steve talking about Margaret bloody Carter with that look on his face for one more minute, he might be sick. 

He's not nearly as lucky as he'd hoped, because Steve? Apparently not done. At all. 

"She's amazing, Bucky. The company was successful under her father, but she managed to single-handedly more than double their turnover and expand operations on three continents. I kept reading about her in the business magazines, but meeting her in person--she's so _alive_ , Buck."

Bucky swallows down the bitter taste Steve's enthusiasm leaves in his mouth, and forces out a smile.

"Sounds like a firecracker. You should call her, take her to dinner. Looks like she'll give you a run for your money in the brains department. Oh, hey, listen, I'm sorry, but I gotta run. I have a client meeting in half an hour on the other side of town."

"Oh," Steve says. Bucky refuses to cringe at the deflated sounds of Steve's voice. He just--he can't. He's not that good a person. 

"Sure," Steve says, trying to muster up some enthusiasm but sounding instead like his hangover has returned in force. Bucky is the worst person ever. "Absolutely, Buck. See you soon?"

"Yeah, count on it," Bucky throws over his shoulder, already half out of the door, running away from Steve's confusion, the kind, accepting smile he flashes Bucky when he turns to wave a hand through the window.

He should have known something this perfect couldn't possibly last.

[ ](http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/lilibel/506865/1067372/1067372_original.jpg)

  
\---

"Bucky," Steve says.

Bucky opens his eyes. Everything is fuzzy, including Steve's face right over him; he gets a blurry impression of blue and gold and concern before he groans and closes them again, feeling nauseous. He'd thought the voices he'd been hearing muttering in the distance were a dream.

"What are you doing here," he croaks, burying his face in the pillow and flapping a hand ineffectually in Steve's direction. "Go away, you're gonna get sick. Make your girlfriend sick, too. I know you wouldn't want that. I'll be fine."

Silence. Bucky cracks one eye open, enough to catch a glimpse of Steve's face. He looks appalled. 

"Bucky, you goddamn idiot, I--" he cuts himself off, biting the inside of his lip. His eyes look too huge for his face. Normally, it'd be a glaring red flag, but fuck, Bucky's so exhausted he can't even _think_ straight. Steve heaves a sigh and drops to sit on the bed at Bucky's side. "You're my best friend," he says plaintively. Bucky winces guiltily, then relaxes again when Steve's hand threads through his hair and smooths it back, away from his face. "Of course I'd come and see you when you're sick, Jesus. Tony would've come, too, but he's got this thing about germs, so instead he's sent you an obscene fruit basket. Though I don't know how long it's going to last, I left it with Natasha and Clint."

"Ugh," Bucky says. "Consider it gone, then. Was a nice thought, tell him thanks."

Steve hums in agreement. His hand never pauses in Bucky's hair, though it's got to feel disgusting, Bucky hasn't showered in three days. His whole body aches, and really, he might moan and grumble but if it weren't for Tasha and Clint, he'd have starved by now. Probably died from dehydration, too. He maybe isn't particularly good at taking care of himself, not when he feels this sick (and even when he doesn't, Steve would say, but Steve is an annoying mother hen and he shouldn't be believed).

Bucky drifts for a while, then, dozes some of the afternoon away, comforted by a familiar presence even in his dreams. He hasn't felt this content in a long time; certainly not in the six months that he's been dodging Steve because he couldn't face being reminded of what he was losing. He surfaces reluctantly after an indeterminate time, loath to lose the comfort but resigned to the inevitability of it anyway. He cracks one eye open to find Steve's long, long legs stretched out, socked feet popped up on the mattress at Bucky's hip. It's so domestic that Bucky's heart gives an unwelcome leap and plunge. There's a StarkPad held deftly in Steve's long fingers; Steve's brows are furrowed, and he's biting at his lip as he stares into the screen. Bucky, helplessly, does not want to be the thing that's put that look on Steve's face.

"It can't be that bad," he says. His voice sounds like he's been chewing gravel and some of it's stuck in his throat. Also? Fucking _ow_. 

Steve's frown, if that's possible, gets worse, now unerringly focused on Bucky. Self-fulfilling prophesy, his fucking _life_.

"Christ, Buck, you sound terrible," Steve says worriedly, giving him a once-over that makes Bucky's skin tingle. Probably another symptom of the plague that he's contracted from god knows where.

"Thanks," he grunts. He _knows_ that, duh. "Why are you still here, I'm gonna give you the plague, too, and then you're gonna die and everything will be terrible."

Steve merely rolls his eyes, which Bucky considers nothing so much as reckless endangerment. 

"I'm not going to die. Christ, Buck, you're making this sound like SARS. It's just a cold, you'll be right as rain in no time."

"But I don't want you to get sick, too," Bucky whines plaintively. "You put up with too much from me as it is."

More silence. (Silence from Steve should be classified as grade-A missile warning system, and Bucky might be sick but there's nothing wrong with his sense of impending doom. Everything about Steve in that moment screams 'Danger, Will Robinson.')

Normal people would ask him to explain. Normal people would band around inane questions like, "What exactly does that mean?", or just do him a favour and take the hint. (He doesn't want Steve to take the hint. He doesn't really want Steve to leave, except for how Steve gets sick from five minutes outside without a coat in 20C spring weather, and what Bucky doesn't want more than Steve never moving from that spot is Steve staying and catching Bucky's plague and dying.)

Anyway. Normal people would request clarification at this point. But Steve Rogers isn't normal people, is he, so there's no suspicious "Just what exactly is going on here?"; there's merely a hiss of inhaled breath, and then--

"James Buchanan Barnes. Is that why you've been avoiding me for the past _six. Goddamn. Months?_ Are you _really_ that big of an idiot? --No, don't answer that," he snarls when Bucky opens his mouth to reply, which Bucky has no choice but to allow is fair, if harsh. There are two spots of vivid colour in Steve's cheeks; his eyes flash violently, boring holes into Bucky's face. He has never looked more beautiful, and Bucky has never wanted to touch him more, just drag him down by the open collar of his shirt and--

Steve snorts derisively; Bucky flushes hot with mortification, that he's given himself away somehow-- But no. It's _worse_.

"Not even gonna answer that, are you? Just gonna drop me like a hot potato, leave me to flounder, wrack my brains to work out how I've managed to offend you. How can you even _think_ \--" He stops, gets up jerkily and shoves the tablet under one arm, runs a frustrated hand through his hair, tugging on the ends a little. "Fuck, Barnes, _get over yourself_."

He pivots on one foot, heading towards the door. Bucky closes his eyes and buries his face in the pillow, listening to the sound of him stomping away. He flinches when the front door slams in the distance.

"Nicely done, Barnes," he mutters to himself, sick with self-loathing. "Top marks on another spectacular screw-up."

"Good," Natasha snaps from the doorway. Bucky doesn't look up; he can conjure her furious expression just fine without. "Now I don't have to say it."

"Go away, Tasha," Bucky groans sulkily. He knows it's pointless, that she's never going to let go so easily, but fuck it, it's worth a try.

For one long, ominous minute, he thinks that was the last mistake he'd ever make; though, honestly? That would kinda be a relief about now. Then, he feels the mattress dip and Natasha's hip settle against his. 

"Damn, Barnes, you're in so deep you can't see straight anymore."

It's unapologetic, daring him to deny it. Since it's also true, he doesn't bother -- he's tired, so tired of denying everything and hoping his brain takes the hint. She doesn't add anything else, but she doesn't leave, either, so Bucky feels free to take the only escape he can, under the circumstances. 

He sleeps again, a little bit, but there's no peace to be found this time, and he feels worse than ever when he wakes up to the quiet sound of Tasha filling Clint in on what he'd missed while he'd been out on a job. Bucky emphatically _does not_ want to hear what Clint has to say, so he drags himself to sitting -- and then has to wait until the room stops spinning, so he's subjected to Clint's grunt of sympathy anyway.

"Poor bastard," comes the habitual rasp from Clint's damaged voice box. "Does Rogers know he's gone on him like the midnight train to Georgia?"

Bucky doesn't need to be listening to this. He feels pathetic enough already, thanks. He pushes himself to his feet, bracing one arm against the wall of his bedroom in his slow struggle to the bathroom. The pounding in his ears drowns out Tasha's reply, for which he's grateful. He manages not to fall face-first into the toilet while he pisses, but by the time he's done and almost misses the flush lever when he flails for it, he's drenched in cold sweat and his knees feel like marshmallow and he has to prop his back on the wall next to it just so he won't throw up. 'Just a cold' his ass. He's _so_ guilting Steve into buying him coffee for a week solid--

The enormity of his cock-up slams into him again, making him retch. He fold to his knees on the cold tiles and presses his forehead to the porcelain, uncaring of its state of cleanliness (it's pretty clean, though, there's a roster and Clint is a stickler for disinfection). He thinks of the anger on Steve's face, the hurt in his eyes, and wonders if just drowning himself here and now wouldn't be the best thing for everyone involved. 

Strong hands slip under his arms, pulling him up until he's sitting on the edge of the bathtub they use for drenching water lilies before planting. He squeezes his eyes closed to keep the spinning room at bay while his helper turns on the tap and splashes around the sink. Then there's a blessedly cool hand pressing to his forehead, and a damp cloth settles against the back of his neck. He groans in relief.

After a minute or two of just savouring the feeling, he looks up and opens his mouth to thank whichever one of his twin psychos has taken mercy on him. The words die on his tongue when it's Steve's frowning face his eyes find, peering down at him with a familiar look of irritated affection.

"You're a damn idiot," Steve informs him before he can scrape a reaction from his fuzzy brain. 

Bucky winces. "I know," he agrees meekly.

Steve sighs. The silence lasts through his removing the cloth, refolding it and placing it back against Bucky's skin. Bucky groans in pleasure, swaying closer.

Steve clears his throat. "I can't believe you thought I was getting tired of you," he says in a small voice. "I guess I haven't made enough of an effort, if that's what--"

Bucky shakes his head violently -- a mistake, because not only does it dislodge Steve's hand, it makes his stomach rebel again. "No," he says hoarsely, focusing on keeping from heaving again. "Steve, Christ, no. You've been great. Too good. Your girlfriend's probably sick of hearing you can't meet her because I need you for something."

Strangely, Steve's sigh is just as exasperated as before.

"No, enough," he says, in that voice that tells Bucky he's not budging an inch. "This is getting ridiculous. Next Thursday, you're coming for dinner, and you're meeting Peggy. Nope, don't even try. I don't know what ridiculous bee you've got in your bonnet about this, but I've had it with your passive-aggressive crap. What do you think she's going to do to you, exactly? Come on, Buck, I know you'll like her, if you just gave her a chance," he pleads when Bucky does nothing but glare mulishly at the floor. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Steve's shoulders square and his mouth take on that determined slant that must have investors quaking in their boots. 

"You owe me, Barnes, for all this nonsense. You're coming and that's final."

He crosses his arms, and Bucky knows there will be no escape. His usual tricks won't work on Steve, will only make him madder and more suspicious, and Bucky knows he's been pushing his luck far too long already. 

Goddamn it. "Fine," he concedes with ill grace, making a face at Steve's triumphant expression. 

Hell, it can't possibly be as bad as his sleepless nights have made it out to be, lying awake torturing himself with thoughts of Steve with a lithe, anonymous figure, of him wrapped in her arms, her body. At least he'll get it over with, and Steve will finally stop trying to ambush him to force the meeting. He can grit his teeth and bear it for one night, steel himself to witness Steve's smiles directed at someone else, to see the proof of what he knows he can't have. He knows he's been making Steve miserable with his pigheadedness, knows that yeah, he _should_ get over himself and stop being such a selfish asshole. Steve wants this, and so Bucky will give it to him. It won't kill him, even if it might seem like it ought to. 

Christ, Clint's right. Being ill turns him into a fucking drama queen. It'll be _fine_.

[ ](http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/lilibel/506865/1066974/1066974_original.jpg)

  
\---

"Steve," he says.

Steve opens his eyes, blinking blearily before focusing on Bucky's face. He looks so, so tired. Bucky hates everything, himself most of all.

"We have got to stop meeting like this," he jokes weakly. His fingers clench in the hospital sheets so hard that there's a ripping sound on the left. Great; another set ruined. He sighs in frustration.

Steve smiles, but it's fake fake fake. Bucky feels sick, and just so overwhelmingly grateful that Steve is there at all, even after the colossal fucking dick Bucky's been to him. If it were Steve who had had a secret love affair with Bucky's girl, no matter how long ago, Bucky doesn't know that he'd be so accommodating. 

(It's a lie, but. Bucky's gotta try here, or he'd be swallowed hook, line and sinker, go straight down under the weight of all the secrets he'd apparently been weaving for over a year before the accident.)

And that doesn't even take into account the fact that Bucky had apparently done everything in his power to keep Steve from finding out he'd been about to run away with the woman. He wants to go back in time, find his twenty-four year old self, and beat him senseless. 

Nothing makes sense anymore. The reasons that had had him paralysed with defiant terror and helplessness seven-odd years ago seem so stupid and flimsy now. He can't believe he'd thought Steve wouldn't understand, wouldn't ache to help. 

Then again, Steve had been at the crux of everything, even if he hadn't known it. Bucky is no more over him now than he had been then, when escape had seemed like the only option for two scared twenty-somethings, the heiress and the penniless rogue. 

Christ, how did his life get so complicated?

And that's not even mentioning the huge neon-pink elephant in the room they are Not Talking About (yet).

They stare at each other, for as long as Bucky can stand it before he has to look away from the simmering hurt in Steve's eyes.

"So," Steve says, so brave, always so much braver than Bucky. "You got everything back? No gaps in time?"

"Yeah," Bucky admits. "Just about everything, and the headache to prove it. Cognitive recalibration is a bitch."

Steve conspicuously does not get up and come closer, does not perch on the side of Bucky's bed, does his best not to touch him at all.

"Do you also remember why you decided not to tell me you were planning to run away and get married?"

_Ouch._ "Steve, I..." He gapes for moment, before his mouth snaps shut. He wants to explain, wants to wipe that awful look from Steve's face; wants to say anything that would fix this -- but he's got nothing. Nothing at all. 

"I'm sorry," he whispers helplessly, bracing himself to watch Steve walk away from him, for good this time.

He should really stop making assumptions , especially about Steve. He should know better.

"What did Peggy mean?" Steve asks, his own voice small and so tentative, Bucky cringes to hear it. At his blank look, Steve adds, "She said that when you disappeared, she figured you'd decided to give it a go with your best friend, once DADT was a thing of the past."

Bucky feels hot and cold all over, aching from loss and discovery and a bone-deep wistfulness that's Steve, always Steve. He's screwed this up enough already; he might as well finish the job. Steve deserves that much, at least.

He breathes, and looks at Steve, and just-- "She meant you, Steve. Christ, I can't believe -- it's always been you. I've loved you for so long, it's like gravity. Peggy figured it out within a couple of weeks. She was smart and straight-talking and a wonderful dancer, and--I liked her. I knew being with you was out of the question, and she _got_ me, she really did, through-and-through. I figured--I figured, what the hell, she seemed to like me well enough, let's give it a go.

"Only then, I--I went and fell for her, Steve. Hard and fast and brutal -- I don't have to tell you, it happened to you, too, just as fast. I was still so torn over you, so confused--aw, hell, I don't know if you can get it, I still don't know how it's possible to love two people _so fucking much_ , at the same time."

He looks up from where he'd been staring at his hands, after a few minutes of dead silence broken only by the beep of the machines tracking his fluctuating vitals. Steve looks--he looks a little wild around the eyes, shocked disbelief splashed all over his face. As Bucky watches, he buries his face in his hands, but they can't muffle the sob of slightly hysterical laughter that spills from his mouth. Bucky's heart drops through his stomach; _I've broken him,_ he thinks. _All these years, and I've finally been too much._

"I actually can't believe this," Steve splutters from behind his palms, fingers digging into his eyes. "My life is a damn soap opera."

Bucky can't do much more than blink and wait for Steve to start making sense again. He's not leaving, which is encouraging, but he's also got tears streaming down his flushed cheeks, which, not so much. The stalemate continues until Steve gets his breathing more or less under control, until he can lift slightly reddened eyes to Bucky's face.

"You," Steve informs him, "are the most oblivious son of a gun I have ever known. How many years, Bucky? _How_ many years have I trailed after you like a lost puppy? How many fights, how many patch-ups, how many cuts and bruises have we been through together? How can you _not know_ \--I thought--when you started pulling away from me right before your second tour, I thought you'd finally figured it out, you finally knew how much--how stupid in love with you I am, and you wanted none of it. I thought--I thought you were sending me a message, that I was losing you. When you woke up and your memory was gone and you smiled at me again, properly, just like always, God, do you, can you even imagine how _relieved_ I was? I thought fate was giving me a second chance. Christ, you drive me _insane_ , do you know that? Couldn't have me, what nonsense. You could have had me _in a second_. You still can."

Bucky reckons that this is probably what a heart attack feels like. His heart is trying to chew its way out of his chest, crawl right out of his throat.

"Steve," he whispers, impossible terror choking him up, that this is a dream, that when he fell and hit his head, he unleashed this hallucination. But Steve is looking back at him steadily, blue, blue eyes as open and earnest as always, weeks and months and years of this gift he keeps on giving, every day. 

"Bucky," Steve says, like it's torn out of him, and the next thing Bucky knows, he's being kissed breathless, stupid, nothing in the world but Steve and his hands on Bucky's face and the taste of him in his mouth and his shoulders under Bucky's grasping fingers. They kiss and kiss until the monitor starts chirping the lack of air in Bucky's lungs, and even then Steve doesn't pull away fully, presses small, heart-melting kisses to Bucky's pliant lips, thumbs stroking his cheekbones reverently. 

When they finally come to a stop, it's with Steve sitting on Bucky's bed, pressing his forehead to Bucky's, spine bent at an unnatural angle that Steve doesn't seem to care about but Bucky knows he's really going to regret later. He eases back down onto the pillows, and Steve stays where he is, turns to brace a knee over the edge of the bed, takes Bucky's hand in both of his. The tiny smile playing over his lips, like he can't hold it back, is truly a sight to behold. 

"So what happens now?" Steve asks, and Bucky's heart warms to hear the fearless, confident quality of the question, like there's nothing they can't face when they're together -- and yes, thanks, he's very much aware of the inexcusable sappiness of that thought, but hell, he's earned some slack. "I mean," Steve adds, smile turning soft and sad, "we're both kinda head over heels for the same gal, Buck. Unless the amnesia shorted your brain out more than you think?"

Bucky winces, grateful when Steve's grip on his hand doesn't slacken in the slightest. "Uh, no. Not so much. It's like all of it happened yesterday, when we know--well, the evidence of how much time has passed doesn't get much more solid than that, you know?"

He takes in the careful, slightly worried look on Steve's face, the way his eyes pinch a little in the corners, and he feels a strange, overwhelming urgency to explain, to make sure Steve knows--

"You know I wouldn't--Steve--you know I'd never--not even if I knew you felt the same way about me, I could never--I'd have--"

"Hey, hey," Steve says gently, stroking over his knuckles with sure fingers. "Bucky, I know. You'd never leave a child behind, or to fend for himself. I know that. It wasn't a choice; it was chance circumstances. Peggy knows that, too."

Bucky subsides, feeling wiped out. His heart rate slows, calms with every swipe of Steve's fingers on his. Christ, what a mess. Six years is a long time when you're James' age. 

"D'you think she'd let me meet him?" he asks quietly, cringing in anticipation of Steve's answer.

"Yes," Steve says immediately, leaning in as if it'd make Bucky believe him more. "Yes, Buck, I'm sure she will. She let _me_ meet him."

Bucky can't bite back his bark of laughter, loud and slightly broken. "Steve, you and I, we ain't the same, pal. There are untold number of things people will trust you with before they even consider me."

Steve shakes his head, but he looks kind of resigned to his fate -- Bucky's self-confidence, when it comes to certain things, could use a bit of a boost, and they both know it.

"You're his _Dad_ , Buck. I still have no idea how I could have missed that, he's the spitting image of you and twice as wild. You'll get on like a house on fire."

"What, with all the screaming and choking? You might be right, at that."

The joke falls flat when all Steve does is level him an unimpressed look. 

"You're an idiot," he says again, like it's a mantra he hangs on to through his days. 

"So you keep telling me," Bucky says, looking down even though his mouth is quirking.

Steve nudges his hip with his knee, threads their fingers together. "He'll love you," he says quietly. "Just as much as you'll love him."

Bucky sighs heavily, willing to concede to Steve's better judgement. 

"What about his Mum?" he says a moment later, because this? This is probably going to be a problem. "You were right," he adds impulsively. "Our lives are a fucking soap opera and then some."

"Right?" Steve chimes in, sending him one of his patented charmingly innocent smiles. It turns softer, more intimate, when he adds, "She's a smart woman, like you said. She'll help us figure it out."

Bucky shrugs, looks down at the way their fingers fit together, like they belong this way. "It might have been like no time passed for me, but for her, it's been over six years. I wouldn't count on--Steve, she moved on. With you. No, listen to me," he insists quickly, tugging on Steve's hand to get him to listen. "I'm going to bow out. I'm willing to bow out if that's what the two of you want, okay?"

Steve glares at him. "Are you getting selective amnesia now? Did you manage to forget the last fifteen minutes? Or are you just angling for a reminder?"

Despite himself, Bucky feels his mouth curve in a smirk. Steve promptly kisses it off his face.

"Besides," he says, when he's left Bucky considerably more breathless than before. "I saw her face when she saw you. Nobody looks like that about someone they don't care for, Buck. She looked like she was going to follow you to the floor. Obviously I don't know what went on between you before, but--I think it's worth talking to her about it, at least. It might not be the same as before, but--hell. It might be _better_. I'll bet you anything she still has feelings for you. You're not that hard a guy to like, and it doesn't hurt that you're pretty easy on the eye."

"You're biased," Bucky argues--it's not that he wants Steve to change his mind exactly, but--Christ, it's been a long time since he's felt this tied up in knots, and it probably means something that there have only ever been two people who have made him feel like this.

"Sure I am," Steve agrees easily. "But so's she. Look, all I'm saying is, don't write this off just yet. Give yourself a chance."

Bucky snorts. "I can't believe I'm getting relationship advice from Steve 'can't talk to women' Rogers."

Steve rolls his eyes. "Yeah, and it's good advice, too. Chew on that some."

Bucky lets his head fall back, closing his eyes. "I'll talk to her," he promises. It's not like...neither of them are going anywhere, are they, and Bucky? He'll do just about anything to be allowed to stay with them.

[ ](http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/lilibel/506865/1067721/1067721_original.jpg)

  
\---

"James?" Peggy says.

Bucky opens his eyes, tries to straighten too fast and promptly flails to keep his balance in the most undignified manner imaginable. _Great job, Barnes. You've always known how to make an impression,_ he grumbles sulkily to himself. 

"Mummy, who's the funny man?" a high yet unperturbed voice demands. Bucky whirls on his toes, locking eyes with--basically, a tiny version of himself. "Steve was right," he has time to think, while Peggy smothers a huff of laughter by biting on her lower lip, eyes dancing where they meet Bucky's, inviting him to share the joke. Christ, if he had any doubts before, they vanish into thin air there and then -- he's still head over heels in love with her, just like six years and change ago.

"Remember that talk we had the other day, darling?" she says kindly, and Bucky watches his own eyes peer out of the small boy's face, darting between him and his mum.

"That's him?" he says. He doesn't sound especially impressed. Bucky can't blame him; god knows he hasn't done anything to deserve his respect as of yet.

"That's him," Peggy confirms. Her smile is warm when she follows her son's eyes to look at his father.

"He doesn't look like a hero," the little boy -- James -- says. 

"Not all heroes wear costumes, love," Peggy tells him gently. Something inside Bucky tightens and then releases again, leaving behind nothing but warmth that fills him all the way up. 

James lets go of his mother's hand, and takes two decisive steps towards him. Then he stops, clearly a little apprehensive to get any closer.

"Mummy says you saved some people's lives, but you got hurt for it, and you forgot us," he says. He's trying to be matter-of-fact, Bucky can see, but he can't hide the undercurrent of hurt simmering through the words.

Bucky gets down on his knees again, letting the trowel drop. He thinks about taking his gloves off, then wonders if the metal hand mightn't freak James out, and settles for removing just the right one. 

"I didn't mean to forget you," he says earnestly. "I hit my head really, really hard. Your Mum didn't know I was still alive, or she'd have found me a lot sooner."

James is silent, digesting this. "Why didn't Uncle Steve tell her?" he asks after a few minutes. 

Bucky tries not to wince too obviously.

"Your Mum and I were keeping a secret," he tells him. "We were going to get married and tell Uncle Steve after. He was going to be your godfather."

James purses his lips in consideration. "But Uncle Phil is my godfather. Is Uncle Steve mad?"

"No, sweetheart," Bucky says immediately, trying out a smile. When James doesn't run away, he carries on, encouraged. "He didn't know, and now he's just your Uncle Steve."

"And you're...my Daddy?"

Bucky has to clear his throat, swallow past the enormous lump in his throat. "Yes. I am."

James nods, a focused, serious expression on his face. "Are you going to go away again?" he asks. His forehead scrunches between his eyebrows, just like Bucky's does when he's anxious and doesn't want to show it.

Bucky drops his glove to the ground, puts his hands on his thighs, tries to look as harmless as he can while James pads hesitantly closer. "No, darling. I'm not going anywhere."

James is maybe a step away from him now, certainly within his reach. Bucky stays very, very still. James stands there and looks at him carefully, like he's committing every feature to memory. "You look like me," he says shyly.

"I do, don't I?" Bucky replies, then gingerly lifts a finger and pokes gently at James' right cheek. "Except for that. That is totally your Mum's." He grins, and James grins, too, dimple very much on show. 

"Are you going to come live with us?" James demands suddenly, and Bucky freezes again, a deer in the headlights of his look. 

"Maybe," he says carefully, eyes going to Peggy without direction from his brain. She raises an eyebrow, but there's a hint of a smile lurking in the corner of her mouth, and all at once Bucky can breathe again. "Not for a while, though."

James appears unconvinced. "But Uncle Steve stays over sometimes. We have pancakes for breakfast. He can make hippo pancakes!" he gushes, eyes wide with wonder.

Apparently, that's all it takes to make six-year-olds completely enamoured of you, Bucky thinks uncharitably, and immediately feels like a dick. Of course James adores Steve. He's _Steve_.

"He is pretty awesome," Bucky agrees. "He won't have to stop staying over, I promise. But anyway, trust me, things aren't changing soon. Maybe I can come over for one of your breakfasts sometime, though?"

"Yeah!" James enthuses. Bucky thinks his face is in imminent danger of cracking in two from grinning so hard, and James doesn't seem far off that point, either.

"James, love, why don't you go find Uncle Steve and ask if he'll make us pancakes tomorrow morning?" Peggy says kindly.

James' little face lights up even more. "Okay!" he yells, legging it to where the French doors near Steve's office are thrown wide open to let in the autumn air.

Bucky looks after him with a strange, kind of choking sensation. "You've done a great job with him, Peg," he says gruffly.

Peggy's clothes rustle as she walks closer. "He is a great little chap," she agrees. 

Bucky swallows, look down to the grass when James disappears inside.

"I'm sorry, Peggy," he says quietly. They've talked a few times since he got his memories stuffed back into his cranium, but he never quite managed to say it before. It seems like the right time, now. Like he can finally speak his mind, let himself say it. "I'm sorry for everything. Fuck, I really screwed up."

Peggy hums, non-committally. A small, light hand lands on Bucky's shoulder, squeezing gently. 

"Don't be," she says softly. "I won't say it's been easy, because it hasn't, far from it. But--no offence, James, but I wouldn't trade it for the world. I've grown up, and I know my own strength now, my capabilities, what I can achieve. I've grown into myself; and I've made some pretty damn decent friends along the way. I learnt whom I can rely on, which of my friends wouldn't bother spitting on me if I was on fire, but also which of them would be there for me when I need a hand. I met Steve. We're on the precipice of something great, all of us, because we all had the chance to take the time to know ourselves. I don't regret it. I missed you -- a lot, every day -- but I was okay without you there to clear my way."

"Mmhm," Bucky murmurs, nodding. Sure, it hurts to know she's moved on, but he's so, so fiercely glad for her that she's found her way, chipped out a space for herself in the world. His smile feels bittersweet, but it is a smile, and he gives it to her: it's her due.

"I'm so happy for you, Peg," he says, doesn't try to hide anything from her, not this time. Wills her to know just how much. "You deserve all the best things in the world, I always said that."

Peggy smiles at him, genuinely happy, that dimple just as present as her son's. Her lively brown eyes are glowing; in her heather sweater and charcoal-grey trousers, she looks.....successful, happy, on top of her world. She looks beautiful, and it aches, but Bucky can't stop looking at her, drinking her in.

"Mummy, Mummy, Uncle Steve said yes," James yells, thrilled; Bucky tears his eyes away from Peggy to see him stomping closer, dragging a smiling Steve in his wake. 

"Hey, you," Steve says, eyes taking both of them in with the same look of deep, warm affection. It's....it makes Bucky's breath hitch, still, to be the subject of it. He knows he and Peggy both return it unreservedly. "So, breakfast, huh. But what about dinner? I have it on good authority that your Uncle Jacques is making courgette gratin, yum!"

James' face falls instantly. "Nooooo," he whines. "Do I have to?"

"Yes." It comes from three directions simultaneously, and they share a quick conspiratorial smile. 

It's a long, long road ahead of them, Bucky knows -- of finding their places in this triumvirate of theirs, of understanding how they all fit together -- _if_ they all fit. But this, here -- this is what gives him hope, what makes him want to try, regardless of the cost. Looking at the two of them, their son (yes, their, always their, like they could possibly separate the tangle of love and protectiveness all of them feel out into its common parts, not possible) in the middle, making pathetic begging faces, he knows: the destination is worth it.

\---

"Daaaaad!!"

Bucky's eyes snap open, heart rate going from 'resting' to 'WHAT THE FUCK ARE THE HORDES OF HELL ATTACKING WHERE ARE ALL MY LIMBS' in a split second. Then something warm and heavy launches itself at him, driving an "Oomph!" of air out of his lungs.

"Bloody--James, it's six in the morning," Peggy groans--a pointless rebuke, since this is far from the first time they've been woken up this way. She buries her head in Bucky's shoulder, curls flopping onto his face, bringing with them a hint of perfume and shampoo that he inhales with relish. He tightens his arm around her shoulders, drawing her further into him and muffling a groan of resignation into her hair.

The bed shakes on his other side; Bucky whines in protest at all this.....wakeful cheerfulness. It's not bloody natural.

Then again, it's _Steve_ , so.

"Come along, scamp," Steve cajoles good-naturedly, smacking a kiss on Bucky's jaw before rolling out of the bed in a display of obnoxious alertness. "Let your parents get a couple more hours of sleep, huh?"

James grumbles, clinging to Bucky's middle before raising his head in sudden inspiration.  
"Steve, can we have pancakes? Pleeeease?" he wheedles hopefully, the sneaky little fox -- it's not like Steve can say no to him, pretty much ever and certainly not when James subjects him to _that look_ , the one that Bucky's pretty sure he lifted wholesale from his old man and uses ruthlessly when he wants to get his way.

"What, are you kidding, of course we can. It's Saturday, isn't it? Saturday is pancake-day, everyone knows that."

James finally relents and crawls backwards off the bed, thundering down to the kitchen with a victorious yell.

"Christ," Bucky mutters, rolling on his side and tangling his legs with Peggy's. "I changed my mind, can I give him back."

"Seconded," Peggy adds dryly, tucking her face in Bucky's neck.

"Aw, you two are a right pair of grumps in the morning," Steve says. The bastard is grinning, Bucky just knows it. "Don't know how James grew up to be such a morning person with parents like you."

"Are you kidding me. That's you all over, Rogers. You know full well parents don't just come of the 'biological' variety."

The silence lasts a beat too long before Steve crawls back onto the bed, turns Bucky's head so, so gently, and then kisses the living daylights out of him. 

"Christ, Buck," he says when he's done. He sounds a bit strangled. Bucky gives him his widest, smuggest grin. His breath only hitches a little when Peggy stretches sinuously half on top of him, rubbing over parts of him that are taking definite interest in the proceedings. She winds her hand around Steve's neck, draws him down for another kiss that leaves Steve flushed, eyes sparkling, lips kiss-bruised and shiny. He is so, _so_ beautiful, Bucky can't quite comprehend how he's real. 

"Go feed the beast, Steve, we'll be down in a bit. Once we've woken up properly," Peggy drawls, with another roll of her hips. Bucky groans, head arching back into the pillow. Steve looks--disappointed. They can't have that.

"Hey," Bucky says, metal fingers twisting into Steve's t-shirt and reeling him in for another thorough kiss. "We've got about four hours to get through before Peggy's parents come pick him up. Afterwards.... well, let's just say, we'll make it up to you," he finishes, hand unfisting from his t-shirt to stroke over his chest, his stomach. 

Steve inhales sharply, pupils dilating; a moment later, he's pushing back away from the bed, straightening with the kind of self-control Bucky knows for a fact he's never going to have.

"You are both terrible people," Steve opines, looking balefully down at the bulge in his sleeping shorts. 

"He won't notice," Peggy says, sultry eyes taking Steve's body in, making wordless promises for later, making sure he knows that James won't notice, but his mum most assuredly has, and she _approves_.

Steve sighs, put-upon, and turns to pad out of the room. His pace quickens noticeably at the crash coming from the direction of the kitchen. Peggy turns to share a sleepy, amused look with Bucky when Steve's gone, because they both know that no matter how much Steve grumbles, he cherishes these times with James more than he'll ever say -- and he pouts like he's the seven-year-old when he has to skip them for whatever reason.

Bucky can't resist the playful glint in her eye. He never could. It's a big part of what got them into this whole thing in the first place, he remembers that now -- there's pretty much no blank spaces left in his mind, not anymore. He leans in and kisses her, tastes a trace of Steve on her lips and groans again, cock filling even further as she shifts into him, body caressing his from chest to groin. She's warm in his arms, sleep-soft and delicious, and he wants her, even more because he didn't get to have her last night -- Steve had been... needy. Knowing he's about to slip into the same space Steve's cock occupied mere hours ago... It's a hell of a turn-on, he won't lie. He slips his fingers lower, traces the edge of her panties, pulls them aside to feel her already slick and eager, fits his (metal, him and Steve aren't the only ones with kinks) thumb against the bundle of nerves that is already swollen, begging for his touch. She gasps into his mouth, slides one leg over his hip, opens herself for his touch. Memories of her from before the blankness mesh with new memories he's made of her in the past year, always welcoming, always _there_ , submerging herself in the moment with the kind of abandon that he is beyond certain is one of the most arousing things he is ever going to experience in his life. He loves the way she commits herself, the way he knows that she's _with him_ \-- and with Steve, when they're together -- without a shadow of a doubt. He has always loved her way of living in the moment, giving herself over fully to this place, this time. 

Her impatient hands have him out of his shorts as if by magic; he helps her shuck her panties, is not prepared for the way she lines him up and rolls her hips and sinks right onto him, gives him no time to catch his breath, just squeeze his eyes shut and let go, let her take control, give her anything and everything she wants, just like always. She sighs in pleasure, braces her hands on both sides of his pillow, flexes her thighs and starts riding him, and it's--it's _everything_.

He doesn't last long; it's a challenge to, with her, the way she gasps into his mouth when she's close, the way her body sways on top of his, like the sea, like breathing, relentless, inexorable in her need. He makes sure to keep his thumb in place, so she can ride it and him both; they muffle each other's moans with their mouths when they finish within moments of each other, and it's so easy, and it's _perfect_ , and he can't give this up, ever again.

"Mmm," she purrs, body loose and sated around him, languid when she leans in for a kiss. "Shower?"

"Yeah," he replies, even though all he wants in the world is to roll over and doze again for a while. But the smell of batter coming in contact with melted butter and hot teflon is wafting up the stairs, mingling with the scent of fresh coffee, and in his mind's eye, he sees Steve at the stove, James milling around him, handing him things and doing the very important job of supervising the pancake cooking, and he wants that too, doesn't think he can live without it anymore.

He doesn't bother to make the bed, not when they're going to get it oh-so-thoroughly messy again in a few hours, once James is off having fun with Peggy's mum and dad for the day. He follows Peggy into the shower, catching a steamy kiss or two before she slips past him, wrapping a towel deftly around herself and scrubbing vigorously at her hair. He comes back out to windows thrown open, letting the fresh autumn air in to nip at his skin while he changes into a t-shirt and a pair of yoga bottoms. It reminds him to call Tasha and confirm they're still on for their yoga class tomorrow, so she can start Clint-wrangling from now -- they're good for him, even if he'll never admit it, and it doesn't hurt that James' godfather frequents the same establishment. Clint can deny it all he likes, but neither Tasha nor Bucky are blind. He makes a mental note to talk to Peggy about this -- it's high time for a friendly intervention, he reckons.

The thought stops him short in the bedroom doorway, the sudden realisation of just how full his life is, how incredibly happy. It's been creeping up on him for a while now, he realises, this knowledge -- that he has friends, he has people, he has... a life. He doesn't know why it seems so shocking, but... if you'd told the kid he was twenty years ago that one day he'll have all this, feel such a sense of inner peace and wellbeing to just be alive-- well, he'd have hoped for it, but never dared to imagine it might happen to him. 

He stays there for just a moment, eyes lingering on the picture on the wall down the hallway, Peggy and Steve and James and him, sea salt crusted in their hair, sand stuck to their shoulders, grinning blindingly into the camera on their holiday to Corfu a couple months ago, and breathes in, and takes the bundle of overwhelming emotions, and gently sets them aside, in his chest, near his heart, and resolves that he won't let himself forget, not this time.

Then, he jogs the last few steps down the corridor, takes the stairs two at a time, impatient to see what his family has got up to without him.


End file.
